Early voters have already seen, and Nov. 5 voters will soon see, five Local Questions on their 2024 ballot. We support all five. They are officially Questions 6 to 10 on the ballot, following a series of five state bond questions.

Question 6 – Financial Town Referendum

We support this question, with reluctance. The Financial Town Meeting is a tradition whose spirit traces back centuries. The town’s citizens have always gathered to keep watch on how and where their government spends its tax revenues. We like keeping such powers with the people.

However, it is time to replace this antiquated form of governance, as many New England communities have. The annual Town Meeting attracts just a sliver of the town’s actual taxpayers, leaving enormous decisions with lasting impact in the hands of just a few.

We appreciate that, in choosing to end the Town Meeting tradition, the Charter Review Commission drafted a new process that still empowers citizens, that preserves the role of the independent Committee on Appropriations, and that improves the system for selecting those committee members. This is a smart improvement to local government.

Question 7 – Housekeeping

These are all timely updates to the Town Charter.

Question 8 – Fire Department

This would remove the Town Council’s ability to eliminate the town’s Fire Department. Considering its role responding to thousands of rescue calls annually, we can’t imagine any future council acting to eliminate the department entirely, but if such a future ever occurred, we would like the bar set higher than a simple 3-2 vote by the council.

Question 9 – Middle School turf

It’s important to remember how we got here. Barrington’s sports fields are deplorable. We are home to the worst collection of youth playing fields in Rhode Island. We are also home to the densest youth population in Rhode Island. So there is enormous demand for abysmally underwhelming facilities.

The point is, we need a solution. Is this the absolute greatest solution, in our minds? No. We would much prefer two other solutions.

The first would be Haines Park. It is vastly underutilized, with a poorly designed collection of scattered playing fields. With smart design and investments, it could become a premier sports complex of natural grass fields that still preserves at least half the space as open and wooded.

The idea enrages neighbors, and no one seems willing to challenge them.

The second would be Chianese Park. It is already a dedicated sports complex, just with atrocious playing surfaces. Artificial turf fields would turn Chianese into the most reliable, accessible and durable solution to all the town’s fields woes.

The idea enrages a few neighbors, and no one seems willing to challenge them.

Thus the middle school is the preferred site for an artificial turf investment, and we support Question 9 as the most realistic solution to a decades-old problem.

Question 10 – Synthetic turf

This question authorizes the town to use more than $4 million, as approved at the 2024 Financial Town Meeting, to install synthetic turf fields on town-owned property other than the middle school, if the town chooses. We enthusiastically support this question.

Approval does not mean the town WILL install turf elsewhere, it simply gives the town the option to do so. Rejection of this question would be a real setback for the future of youth recreation and sports in Barrington.